Emissions Inventory Summary

1. Introduction

This emissions inventory report has been prepared and written in accordance with Part 7.3.1 of ISO 14064-1 and is designed to be used in the process of being on the path to carbon neutrality by 2012.

2. Statement of intent

Land Information New Zealand is one of the 28 stage two core public service agencies that will be on the path to carbon neutrality by the year 2012. This programme will be broken down into three key stages which are set out below;

• Measure emissions
• Reduce emissions
• Offset unavoidable emissions ¹

3. Organisation description

Land Information New Zealand (LINZ) provides New Zealand's authoritative land and seabed information. It advises the government on land-related laws and policies and administers the government's land interests and inward foreign investment regime. It also provides a secure environment for buying or selling property, and ensures New Zealand has high-quality core geographic information.

LINZ aims to ensure:

• certainty of New Zealand's property rights and interests
• land information is available
  • to enable the New Zealand economy to function effectively, and
  • for New Zealanders' safety and security
• Crown assets are put to their best use.

Day-to-day business is associated with:

• policy advice to government
• geodetic and cadastral survey infrastructure
• maintaining up-to-date topographic and hydrographic information
• land titles regulation
• standard setting for rating valuation
• Crown property management, acquisition and disposal
• assisting the Government address land-related aspects of Treaty of Waitangi issues
• administering Government's inward foreign investment regime, including monitoring significant investment into New Zealand and assessing applications for consent from foreigners who intend making substantial investments
• services related to land titles and survey plans:
  
  • issue of state-guaranteed titles
  • registration of changes to land titles
  • search services for land titles and survey plans
  • survey plan processing and approval.

LINZ has five regional offices located in Auckland, Hamilton, Wellington, Christchurch, Dunedin, together with a national office in Wellington.

LINZ has approximately 540 employees and an operating budget for 2007/2008 of $135 million (Vote Lands).

4. Persons responsible

• The Chief Executive, Brendan Boyle has overall responsibility for the emissions inventory
• Tony Murray, Manager Finance is the person who has approved the documents for the carbon neutral programme
• The following people have been involved in the preparation of this document:
  
  • Sue Escott - Business Advisor Govt3 Performance
  • Tony Murray - Manager Finance
  • Justine Gilliland - Manager Strategic Communications
  • Anthony Lapwood - Receptionist
  • Finance Processing Team

5. Organisational boundaries included for this report period

The Agency uses the financial control based approach to defining organisational boundaries. Due to the legally prescribed nature of the core public service, the application of either the control or equity approach is likely to have the same effect, as government agencies do not have subsidiaries, associate companies in the same manner that private sector companies have group structures, or complex lease arrangements.

The organisational boundaries of an agency are defined by statute and for the purposes of the GHG inventory include core agency activities only.

A copy of our organisational chart is below:

6. Emissions sources inclusions

Emission sources were identified with reference to the methodology described in the GHG Protocol and the ISO 14064-1 (2006) standard. Identification of emissions sources was achieved using the specific guidance on Scope 3 factors included in the Cabinet Paper POL (07) 131: Towards a Sustainable New Zealand: Carbon Neutral Public Service. Further guidance was obtained from the Ministry for the Environment.

These emissions have then been classified into three categories. The definition of each has been adapted from the GHG Protocol; the three types of emissions are;

• Direct emissions (Scope 1): emissions from sources that are owned or controlled by the agency.
• Indirect emissions (Scope 2): emissions from the generation of purchased electricity consumed by the agency.
• Indirect emissions (Scope 3): emissions that occur as a consequence of the activities of the agency, but occur from sources not owned or controlled by the agency. Inclusions of these are determined on case by case basis, and relate to the agency's aims of the programme.

Actual emissions

'No biomass is used in Land Information New Zealand's operation and therefore no emissions from the combustion of biomass are included.

7. Emission sources exclusions

Justifications:

Staff commuting to work is considered to fall under the personal carbon foot print of the employee as the agency has little control over where people choose to live; therefore this is outside the Scope. Work will be undertaken to produce travel plans to help reduce this effect under a further scheme.

Travel by consultants, not booked through Land Information New Zealand but charged back to us as part of their project work, is currently not captured. We will be reviewing processes to be able to capture this information in the future.

Disposal of corporate waste such as PC equipment and furniture is not currently quantified. These items are disposed of over and above the normal daily waste sent to landfill. Where possible PC's and monitors are currently donated to schools and charities, however figures for the volume of donated items verses disposal is not currently available. Furniture is re-used where possible or sold, pending its condition. As with other goods and services we will be looking at the full life cycle of products, including take back and recycling requirements in tender processes.

8. Base year selected

This is Land Information New Zealand's first report. The chosen base year calculated for this report is the year from 1 July 2006 to 30 June 2007.

9. Data collection quantification of methodologies

The table below details the sources of the relevant data and the emission factors which have been used. All the factors have been approved by the Ministry for the Environment. The amount of C02e has been calculated by multiplying the activity data sourced by the agency by the relevant emission factor. As this is the first year that the agency has produced these figures there have not been any changes in methodology to report.

10. Emission reductions and removals

Land Information New Zealand has achieved no significant emissions reductions for this reporting period as this is the first reporting period and established Land Information New Zealand's baseline year emissions.

Land Information New Zealand will have a management plan in place for managing and reducing emissions by early 2008 with the aim to be on the path to carbon neutrality by 2012.

11. Uncertainties

12. Verification of the GHG Inventory

This inventory has not been verified.

13. Chief Executive Sign Off

Date

26 November 2007

Signed

Brendan Boyle
Chief Executive - Land Information New Zealand